August 13, 2008Ill and in Pain, Detainee Dies in U.S. Hands By NINA BERNSTEINHe was 17 when he came to New York from Hong Kong in 1992 with his parents and younger sister, eyeing the skyline like any newcomer. Fifteen years later, Hiu Lui Ng was a New Yorker: a computer engineer with a job in the Empire State Building, a house in Queens, a wife who is a United States citizen and two American-born sons.

But when Mr. Ng, who had overstayed a visa years earlier, went to immigration headquarters in Manhattan last summer for his final interview for a green card, he was swept into immigration detention and shuttled through jails and detention centers in three New England states.

I have a friend from South Africa that does everything the right way to be here legally and it is a buch of bs. It cost him a good bit of money and is always such a hassle and time consuming. His most recent problem was he had been waiting forever some kind of card or passport so that he could fly to SA to his mother who has cancer and when he got it it had his name as "Carlos" instead of "Carlo" so now he has to go thru it all again to get it corrected.

I ain't askin' nobody for nothin, If I can't get it on my own. - Charlie Daniels

My father actually works at Donal Wyatt (chaplain, not guard) and he said that Ng was flipping out and assaulting other inmates when he was taken to Hartford. Apparently, it had to do with a reaction to medication...

So I guess I'll be the bad guy yet again in one of these threads and point out that if the guy in the first story (Mr. Ng) hadn't overstayed his visa in the first place, none of this would have happened. Of course it doesn't excuse what happened (if that is the way it went down - one sided story so hard to say), but none of it ever would have been an issue if Mr. Ng had just done what he was supposed to do in the first place.

Bash away though, I'm used to it and know everyone will want to argue the aftermath instead of what actually caused the problem to begin with. *yawn*

Yes doctor, I am sick.Sick of those who are spineless.Sick of those who feel self-entitled.Sick of those who are hypocrites.Yes doctor, an army is forming.Yes doctor, there will be a war.Yes doctor, there will be blood.....

It's not the whole point. It's part of it. The other part being exactly what Madison stated. Nobody is going to argue with what happened being right, but it was avoidable.

I agree...INS should have deported him right when his visa was up instead of stringing him along, then he could have died (or maybe even gotten treatment) in his own country...but no, they strung him along and only when the guy tried to extend his stay here legally do they do anything about it

Frankly, no. The only way to focus on the aftermath is to excuse Mr. Ng of his responsiblity to do what he was supposed to do, which he didn't. Sorry, when someone screws up and causes themselves a problem, I don't just ignore that or shift the blame to someone else. Ultimately and without question, had Mr. Ng done what he was supposed to do, this wouldn't have happened. That is the point, or at least should be. The claims are secondary and worthy of an investigation by the authorities, but it certainly isn't the "whole" point. A very tiny fraction at most.

Yes doctor, I am sick.Sick of those who are spineless.Sick of those who feel self-entitled.Sick of those who are hypocrites.Yes doctor, an army is forming.Yes doctor, there will be a war.Yes doctor, there will be blood.....

Frankly, no. The only way to focus on the aftermath is to excuse Mr. Ng of his responsiblity to do what he was supposed to do, which he didn't. Sorry, when someone screws up and causes themselves a problem, I don't just ignore that or shift the blame to someone else. Ultimately and without question, had Mr. Ng done what he was supposed to do, this wouldn't have happened. That is the point, or at least should be. The claims are secondary and worthy of an investigation by the authorities, but it certainly isn't the "whole" point. A very tiny fraction at most.

So then a suitable, proportionate punishment for overstaying a visa is death. OK, got it.

Are you really going to claim that b/c someone overstayed a visa that the immigration employees bear zero responsibility for seemingly breaking all sorts of rules and ignoring what appear to be clear signs of severe health problems while he was in their custody and under their purview and therefore their responsibility (its not like he was a cancer-ridden homless guy passed out on a street corner that they chose to step over), eventually leading to a life-and-death situation that they could and, according to the job description, should have prevented? How can you seriously claim that what appears to be a complete dereliction of duty only played a negligible, if any, part in Ng's death?